Tag Archives: New England

Weekly photo challenge: Delicate

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A delicate balance of stones – at a Buddhist meditation retreat center in rural New England (Image by LIz Cameron)

Yes, this is my Weekly Photo Challenge entry for “Delicate,” and yes, I am entering a photo of a stone wall.  Karagöz scoffs at the notion of a stone wall as delicate…but reconsiders.  Let me tell you the story of how he came to reconsider.

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This past weekend, I went to my first Buddhist meditation retreat – the retreat was named “Patience: Emptying the Ocean with a Teacup.”

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Meditation Hall at Barre Center for Buddhist Studies (Image by LIz Cameron)

And let me tell you, the Karagöz puppets in my head were anything but patient from the week before I went – to the time our car entered the long driveway through wintry woods.  You can read about that here.

Yet, as soon as we reached the Center, the the Karagöz puppets, well, they really started to get quiet. And I was surprised about that. Even Karagöz himself, with all of his oppositional, defiant and jokester ways, he had inhaled a dose of silence before I even started meditating.  I just stopped, and listened to the silence of my puppets. They were picking up on the vibe of the place, taking it all in.

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The loop of road, surrounded by stone walls, that taught me about patience and balance (Image by Liz Cameron)

As we went up to the meditation hall (pictured here), those puppets, they became even more calm as we sat in lotus style, and began to practice circular breathing before the teacher was to arrive.  I just worked on noticing only my breathing, just this moment now, nothing else, letting other thoughts be noticed only in their passing by – not counting and categorizing them.  Kenne, the Queen of Matters and Etiquette and Maintenance of Ladylike Behavior was the one who struggled most – not only was she documenting Buddhist meditation retreat etiquette in spades, but she really disapproved of the non-ladylike poses.  I just let her do her own thing…and she was silent after a time, but still taking notes for her new etiquette treatise.

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An homage to the Buddha, within a stone wall structure (Image by Liz Cameron)

Mostly, I was just amazed at myself, I could finally just focus on breathing.  I have always had trouble with that aspect of meditation, and for some reason this wild time in my life, I was finally able to let go and fall into the delicate balance of breathing and detached noticing of thoughts ambling by.  .

And so I learned tremendous amount about how to “practice” patience in different moments, in different ways – to balance patients as an antidote to anger or upset. And during one of our exercises on “walking meditation,” in which the goal is to just focus on how your feet touch the ground and how it feels in that moment, while breathing, I headed outside to see if I could tolerate meditation in a more stimulating place.  It was a chilly, grey day – and a slight breeze wrapped that chill around me.  I began to walk around the loop surrounded by beautiful old handmade stonewalls.

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I think even my Dad would not scoff at the use of mortar in this stone-balancing act of a dome to honor the Buddha as they only used it towards the top (Image by Liz Cameron)

Now, I grew up in New England, and I have seen a lot of stonewalls. My Father, a sturdy Yankee type, used to point out the best of those stone walls to me.  He would stop on a country road to look at a particularly exquisite, balanced wall, explaining to me the delicate process of collecting the stones (heaved up by the winter frost), saving them in a pile, and in the spring, deciding how each one fit together in the most balanced way, without using mortar, of course. He would scoff at the stonewalls in which mortar or cement was used to hold things together.  Sometimes we practiced making stonewalls, I think now, it must have been an exercise of learning how to be patient and calm – really a meditation – on the different shapes and weights of the stones and it struck me that here at this Buddhist retreat, these stone walls, it is really an example of a delicate strength.

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Looking at the world of the Barre Center for Buddhist Studies from the top of an ancient stone wall – with a world of lichens and mosses to contemplate (Image by Liz Cameron)

In an errant serious moment, Karagöz whispered “this delicacy of careful stone placement and rock positioning is all towards the goal of long term balance.” “Yes,” Karagöz, I said, “yes it is.” So, while you might not instantly associate a stone wall with something delicate, I ask you to consider the balance aspect of a true stonewall, made without mortar, and the skill of patience that building process infuses in you, that the makers of such things must engage in to be successful.

Related articles that show other people’s approaches to “Delicate” in the Weekly Photo Challenge:

“Hayır!” and “No!”: The Karagöz puppets protest November

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Image taken by accident by Liz Cameron, and approved by M. as an interesting composition. It seems appropriate for the lack of light that New Englanders experience in the end of November. The puppets crave the light and warmth of south western Turkey in the summer – not this raw blue stuff. They are a bit homesick, you see.

“Hayır!” and ”No!” These were the first words I heard this morning.  One in English and one in Turkish.  In choosing to speak both languages, the puppets were embracing their cross-cultural status.  You see, it has been almost a decade that they have been on leave from the Ottoman court and in residence in my head here in Provincetown, Massachusetts.  And today, those puppets were all about the negative.

“We have,” Yehuda Rebbe said, speaking for the group, “had it with November in New England.  We want NO more of it. No more cold. No more raw, damp air.  No more rain that turns to snow. No more brussel sprouts.  No more chilly fingers. No more November. Hayır!” His proclamation met with so many “Huzzahs” that I thought we might have awoken in a Charles Dickens novel, but soon realized it was not the case when I looked up at the top of the window wall across from my bed.  There, in the pre-dawn blue light, I saw a news ticker, words slipping and sliding across the digital cradle in a manner that created mini strobe-lights in the darkened room.

November

November (Photo credit: Cape Cod Cyclist)

As all the puppets clumped together on the windowsills, shivering with the breeze coming in through those ancient windows, Hacivad Bey made his own statement:

“M’lady, much as we love your love of the autumn, we side with the little-known poet, Thomas Hood, in his revolt against November.  We have installed it here in order to celebrate the LAST day of this dratted month in New England.  Perhaps this coming month will be a new leaf for you.”

I could have almost cried for the care and attention from the puppets this morning, as I, too, felt the No! of November, one of the toughest months of my life. And here is what the puppets had programmed into that ticker machine – lord knows where they found that out here at the end of the world!

No!

A poem by Thomas Hood

No sun–no moon!
No morn–no noon!
No dawn–no dusk–no proper time of day–
No sky–no earthly view–
No distance looking blue–
No road–no street–no “t’other side this way”–
No end to any Row–
No indications where the Crescents go–
No top to any steeple–
No recognitions of familiar people–
No courtesies for showing ‘em–
No knowing ‘em!
No traveling at all–no locomotion–
No inkling of the way–no notion–
“No go” by land or ocean–
No mail–no post–
No news from any foreign coast–
No Park, no Ring, no afternoon gentility–
No company–no nobility–
No warmth, no cheerfulness, no healthful ease,
No comfortable feel in any member–
No shade, no shine, no butterflies, no bees,
No fruits, no flowers, no leaves, no birds–
November!

As my eyes grew used to the sparking digital display, I remembered the poem that my Mother used to read to us every November 30th, and realized the puppets must have found that crevice of my brain, and retrieved the poem.  We always celebrated the end of the dreary – and the start of the festive season, full of love, friendship and hope towards the new year.  Many thanks to my puppets for this end-of-November treat.

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Of Elma and Indian corn: Karagöz puppets as marriage counselors

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Elma (Image by Liz Cameron)

Elma/apple (Image by Liz Cameron) Nazim Hikmet is said to have commented on his poetic ambition as follows:“I want to write poems that both talk only about me and address just one other person and call out to millions, I want to write poems that talk of a single apple, of the plowed earth, of the psyche of someone getting out of prison, of the struggle of the masses for a better life, of one man’s heartbreaks, I want to write about fearing and fearing death.”

Written a few weeks ago before Frankenstorm waited in the wings and before this rotator cuff injury ate my writing hand (my right hand is miffed at this comment):

Today, the Karagöz puppets awoke with resolve. “We are,” they cried in odd unison, “going to experience the New England countryside!”

Furling my sleepy brow in confusion, I queried “why, after all these years in New England, have you chosen *today* to go to the countryside?”

Karagöz somersaulted forward, explaining in dizzy circles, “It’s because, m’lady, we’re here to save your marriage – you need a

Indian corn and Fuji apples (Image by Liz Cameron)

Indian corn and Fuji apples (Image by Liz Cameron)

date! Go pick elma (apples) and Indian corn in the sunshine, it’s the best prescription for smiles and happy times.”

And so we did.

And it was crowded and touristy – but we found some silent orchard paths and a few varieties we won’t be happy to live without – Fuji and Jonah Gold to be specific!

And here is how the house looks now, buried in a sea of apples on every open surface. Well worth the effort.

We came home and I read M.’s favorite Nazim Hikmet a bit – and came across this phrase in which he described his ambition as a poet: “I want to write poems that both talk only about me and address just one other person and call out to millions, I want to write poems that talk of a single apple, of the plowed earth, of the psyche of someone getting out of prison, of the struggle of the masses for a better life, of one man’s heartbreaks, I want to write about fearing and fearing death.”

Fuji apples (Image by Liz Cameron)

Fuji apples (Image by Liz Cameron)

Indian corn and Fuji apples (Image by Liz Cameron)

Indian corn and Fuji apples (Image by Liz Cameron)

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